So I'm there a little early (at last, nice snowman-making weather here in the Burgh, and yet it doesn't really slow the buses down much at all), figuring I'll just catch Columbia and Heidi (see past posts) and I'm sitting at the bar nursing my Sam Adams contemplating the so-so dancing, when this woman with this really glamorous wide-eyed lip-glossed face, intense without being overdone, walks right up to me and squeezes my arm and ask if she can sit by me, and I look at her and the first thing I wonder is "What the hell is Eliza Dushku doing in this place?" (And no, it's not like I'm a big Eliza fan, I've been aware of her but somehow never felt riveted by her -- until now). We inform each other quickly enough: turns out this Natalya is a new hire, just been there one month, and she's from Russia, though the accent is very faint. So we chat, and she tells me she needs to tell me a secret, so she leans forward and breathes hotly into my ear, at which I point I figure, Let's go upstairs and discuss this secret of yours.
Not sure how she latched onto me so passionately -- truth to tell, she seems thorougly mercenary, and I was not looking at all that prosperous that night, no trenchcoat, none of that. Then again, the club has been slightly slower of late, men still come but the Great Recession causes them to beg off taking a dance -- all the better for me, of course, because I never go without being loaded for bare, cashwise. And it was to be quite an expensive night ...